


Of Basements and Memories

by CaptainCoughdrop



Series: Disasters [9]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: I put Macau as a character even though he's more just mentioned, I swear the amount of research I put into this, Most of the characters only appear in flashbacks, My longest work yet!, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 00:48:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14225490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainCoughdrop/pseuds/CaptainCoughdrop
Summary: His head felt fuzzy and clouded, everything just out of reach. Kiku couldn’t remember what had happened, but something must have for him to have woken up in a basement with Russia of all people for company.Part 10 of the Disasters verse.





	Of Basements and Memories

**Author's Note:**

> I finally return! And with what I think may just be my longest work yet!
> 
> OK, so it’s more just a collection of drabbles, but I was trying to get across the fact that Kiku’s kinda spacey at first. Also, to be honest, he doesn’t really do much or go anywhere during this period, so it would be really boring if I just described what he was doing.
> 
> So, this covers the time period from when Kiku woke up from the coma he went into after his country was hit by the atomic bombs (sometime during September) to around the summer of 1946. I’ve actually written up a timetable of events happening to the actual nations during this AU, so I am following a plan – I was sort of tempted to post that, but I feel like that’s just spoilers. I might at some point if I decide I’ve finished writing these, though.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

‘ _Dobro pozhalovat’, tovarishch_!’

Kiku’s eyes – eye, what was wrong with the right one? – opened slowly and painfully, as he tried to adjust to the dim light of the room he was in. Rough, concrete walls, no windows, and cold air. As he breathed in, the air was musty and damp. He was underground, then. That was rarely good.

Even worse was the person sat beside his bed. Russia’s eyes gleamed brightly as they met Kiku’s – and something was wrong, something was very wrong, he could feel it but he couldn’t tell _what_ – a sinisterly childish smile on his thin face. The tall nation cocked his head, his smile widening, waiting for a response.

‘I…’ Kiku knew very little Russian besides a few passing phrases and words that were all probably horribly mispronounced. ‘What…’

His head felt fuzzy and clouded, everything just out of reach. Kiku couldn’t remember what had happened, but _something_ must have happened for him to have woken up in a basement with _Russia_ of all people for company. He blinked, trying to will some of the fog away, but it stubbornly resisted.

Where was he? And why was Russia here with him? Russia was crazy and dangerous – that much Kiku could remember. Plus, they were enemies, so Kiku felt like he had a right to be concerned. He tried to sit up, but, terrifyingly, his body refused to respond. What was happening?

Kiku began to panic slightly, even though his brain and body felt drained and very much not in the mood for panic. Even though he had little doubt that with his clouded mind and the fact that the fire bombings and the food shortages had left him weak Russia could easily defeat him, the inability to move made his heart speed up.

Apparently, Russia noticed his alarm, because he giggled.

‘Ah, no need to worry,’ he said in Mandarin, and Kiku stared at him, barely able to move his head. He felt drained and exhausted. Sleep sounded amazing right now. But going to sleep with only Russia for company? Not happening. ‘You are on a lot of medication, da?’

Medication. That would explain it, Kiku realised, but didn’t calm down much – he was still in some sort of basement, and with _Russia_.

‘Why am I here?’ He asked warily, also in Mandarin. It flowed easily from his tongue, and for a brief moment he thought of Yao, before pushing that thought down, as he had done for a long time. ‘Why are you here?’ He thought for another moment. ‘Where is here?’

For a moment, Russia just smiled. ‘We are in my house, in Yakutia. I don’t believe you’ve ever been here before.’

‘No.’ _Because I’m not that crazy_.

The horrible feeling was rising again – Russia looked far too self-satisfied, far too smug, far too _victorious_ for Kiku’s peace of mind. Something bad had happened. Very, very bad. He felt sick. _What was going on_?

‘Russia-san,’ he started, trying in vain to make his fingers move more than useless twitching against the scratchy blankets. ‘Why am I here? Please, what happened?’

Russia grinned then – not his usual childish smile, but a full on serial killer grin that made Kiku’s stomach tense, because if Russia smiled like that, it couldn’t be good. Kiku wasn’t so scared for himself – no matter what Ivan did he would always just wake up again, and at this point in the war, he was thoroughly beyond caring about his own safety – but something was telling him that something awful had happened.

‘Ah, you really cannot remember, little Yaponiya?’ Russia cooed, reaching over and patting his head lovingly. Kiku tried to move away, but he barely managed to flinch. Russia’s grin widened. ‘You’ve lost the war.’

That was… Not exactly a surprise, if Kiku was honest with himself. He’d long since accepted defeat. But there was something different this time- something wrong. He’d lost wars before. Usually, there was a sense of relief- his people would stop fighting, stop dying, and everyone would start to calm down a little. But not this time. He just felt a sick, roiling sensation in his stomach.

Something was very, very wrong.

 

 

 

Ivan, being Ivan, didn’t deign to tell him any more than that.

Kiku was left in the basement – and that wasn’t ominous at all – trying to fight his way through the persistent fog of his mind. It was maddening. He couldn’t even leave to stretch his legs. For one, movement at all was still an enormous struggle, beyond spasmodic twitches of his fingers or maybe turning his head ever so slightly – and, second, because even if he _was_ able to stand and walk about, Ivan always made sure the lock the door behind him.

It was usually silent in the basement, but on occasion he’d hear Ivan talking to someone else in another part of the basement; sometimes, he’d hear screams. This didn’t do much to make Kiku feel any better about his present situation.

It would be easier, he thought, if he had any way of knowing what time it was. Or even what _day_ it was. Ivan had alluded to the fact that he’d been unconscious for a while, but how long was a while? A few days? Weeks? _Months_? Ivan wouldn’t tell him. Kiku couldn’t count time, or count the days, other than by instinct. He had a good idea that he’d been here for a few days, now – judging by the fact that Ivan would turn on the lights in the mornings (?) and turned them off in the evenings (?), except for those days that he forgets, or those days where Kiku had a good feeling he didn’t turn them on till late. But, with his mind so foggy, it was a bit difficult to keep a train of thought for more than five minutes, let alone complete the mental arithmetic required to figure out how long he’d been in Ivan’s basement. Especially factoring in how long he would sleep for – Kiku had a suspicion that he was easily sleeping for a lot longer than quick cat-naps.

 

 

 

_Yao wouldn’t look at him._

_The small voice at the back of Kiku’s head – the same voice that had agreed with Lien – said that this mistrust was fair enough. Kiku had, after all, injured him rather badly. Even though Kiku had made sure Yao was cared for by a doctor afterwards, it was still a savage thing to do. Barbaric, in fact, the voice told him._

_Kiku crushed that voice mercilessly, along with any regret that sprung up whenever he saw Yao moving so carefully, or wincing in Tai Chi practice, or just blanking him in the halls._

_His generals and higher-ups wanted him to speak to Yao, being under the misguided impression that if Yao was on side, China would be on side. Kiku had, on several occasions, had a tray of tea and perhaps some mochi made up for this planned conversation with his brother, but every time, like clockwork, his courage failed him before he could enter Yao’s room._

_This only served to infuriate him, and just served to make him angry whenever Yao was around. To his surprise, this pleased several of his generals, who congratulated him on taking a no-nonsense attitude with his wayward Chinese brother. That had only made Kiku feel uncomfortable, which made him angrier around Yao, and the whole vicious cycle repeated itself._

 

 

 

No matter how incapable he was of pulling together even a scrap of intelligence and focus for even ten minutes, Kiku still found himself pondering over the problem. Mostly, of course, because there wasn’t much else to do. The omnipresent fog in his mind seemed to be blocking his ability to sense what was going on in his home, but every time he tried he still felt a thrill of nauseating panic.

Sometimes, he’d slip into a daze where he didn’t think of anything at all – not quite asleep, just staring blankly at the ceiling. He didn’t know how long he did this for, but it concerned him all the same. He wasn’t someone who spaced out – he’d always prided himself on his focus and awareness. Although, he supposed, there wasn’t really much to be aware _of_ , down here.

 

 

 

_Kiku didn’t bother looking for his teacher. Partly because, like Lien, he had no doubt that she’d take a tremendous amount of enjoyment out of poking holes in his grand-plan, but mostly because he had no interest in spending the next six months being led on a merry chase around the Mongolian Steppe. His teacher may have taught him to follow people’s tracks, but that also meant she knew how to hide her own, and he had better things to be doing with his time._

 

 

 

Ivan visited him every day to administer medication. Kiku didn’t really know what it was, and Ivan never told him, but Ivan gave it to him with a needle, and his daily visits were both the best and worst part of Kiku’s day.

On one hand, it was nice to have a little company, even if Ivan’s special brand of company wouldn’t exactly be Kiku’s first choice. Even though he slept a lot it got a little lonely down in that basement, and this was coming from a man who had spent over two hundred and twenty years with only rare contact with his fellow nations. But it was different, alone and cold in a foreign country, not knowing what was happening back home, unable to move.

On the other hand, this was Ivan, and he seemed to draw significant amusement from taunting Kiku, alluding to facts and events he didn’t know, playing mind games, and generally being annoying. That wasn’t even including the daily needle in the shoulder, which Kiku couldn’t actually feel (and that worried him even more than the fact that Ivan of all people was in charge of administering medication, to be honest).

“How are we today, Yaponiya?” Ivan would coo every day, before seating himself on the little stool beside Kiku’s bed. Kiku would attempt to formulate some cutting response – he never knew when Ivan would turn up, so he could never adequately prepare himself – before giving up when it proved too difficult in his fuzzy mind.

“Russia,” he’d say – after the first day, Ivan had no longer appreciated the use of either Chinese or Japanese, and ‘-san’ apparently counted. He gently put this idea forward by putting a massive hand around Kiku’s throat and squeezing until black spots were blinking in front of his eyes. Unfortunately, being in a medication-induced haze wasn’t particularly conducive to mastering a new language, so it was slow going, and so far, the only new word that Kiku had learnt and that hadn’t immediately slipped from his mind was ‘Russia’.

Once that communication was over, Ivan would chatter away in rapid-fire Russian – apparently hoping that Kiku would learn his _impossible_ language via osmosis or something – and Kiku would try to separate the individual words, before inevitably failing and instead wondering just why Ivan insisted on wearing that same military jacket with all of his shiny medals _every day_. (Did he wear it everywhere? He couldn’t do, surely. Maybe he kept it on a special hook outside the room and pulled it on before he came to bother Kiku. If he did, that was a level of pathetic-ness that even some of Kiku’s more posturing generals would struggle to emulate.)

 

 

 

_“You’re an idiot, little brother,” Lien rolled the bánh cam around in her fingers, her cheek propped up on her fist. “If you think this is a good idea.” “_

_It is a good idea, Onēchan,” he ground out. They’d been having this same conversation in a circle for the last half an hour, and Kiku was well aware that they weren’t going anywhere. He raised a hand and scrubbed his hand over his shaven head, his hair cut short for practical reasons whilst he was out in the field. “Asians for Asians.”_

_“_ _That’s great, on paper,” drawled Lien, putting down the treat and brushing sesame seeds from her fingers. “_

_It’s great in practice,” snapped Kiku. “My people are protecting Asia from the imperialist Europeans. We modernised without them – we’ll help the rest of Asia to do the same. Without the violence.”_

_“_ _Oh? Without the violence?” Lien’s voice was suddenly razor sharp, but Kiku held his ground and didn’t allow himself to waver. “What do you call what your people did in Nanking, for example, little brother? And don’t think I haven’t heard of that little torture chamber your people are running in China.” _

_Kiku remained silent, his back ramrod straight._

_“_ _I don’t know, little brother.” Lien sat up and stretched. “What your people are doing – what you are doing – seems pretty violent to me.” She waved a hand to the waitress, who cast Kiku a nervous look. Lien raised an eyebrow at him, and, with a muscle pulsing in his jaw, he paid their bill. “So, thank you for the offer, Kiku, but I think I’ll pass, thanks.”_

_“It wasn’t an offer, Lien,” he growled. “It’s going to happen. You may as well accept it.”_

_“Kiku.” Lien’s voice was sharp. “Have you ever known me to give up a fight?” _

_“No,” he grudgingly admitted. Lien threw back her head and tied back her long brown hair._

_“Well, I’ll see you later, little brother,” his sister gazed at him for a long moment. “I hope you see sense soon.”_

_Kiku opened his mouth to tell her he saw sense perfectly well, thank you very much, but she’d already disappeared into the swirling crowds of her people_.

 

 

 

Finally, Ivan stopped giving him the medication. He didn’t explain why – or, maybe he did, but he did so in Russian. Since Kiku was no closer to understanding conversation Russian as he had been when he first arrived, Ivan may as well have explained it in Farsi, so Kiku was none the wiser as to what the reason was.

In a way, he was glad that the medication was stopped. He had a feeling that it was to blame for the fog in his mind, and he was really fucking sick of it.

However, it hadn’t occurred to him how much pain his body was actually in, and he soon regretted losing it. Sure, it was nice to be able to move and think more clearly, but there was the downside of feeling as though he’d been dipped in gasoline and set on fire.

Kiku had been through uncountable battles throughout his long life – both internal and otherwise – but nothing compared to this. It was a burning, sick sort of feeling, making his empty stomach feel nauseous. He’d been burnt before – the fire-bombings of his cities came painfully to mind – but this was the worst thing he’d ever felt. It felt like the burning was still happening, gnawing deep into his melted flesh and diseased bones. It didn’t matter how he twisted – he was capable of some movement now – or how he attempted to hold the coarse blankets slightly off his body, he was in constant agony. On the plus side, he was still capable of sleeping for hours at a time, and he attempted to remain asleep for as long as possible.

 

 

 

_Unlike Yao, Kiku did manage to sit down and have tea with Yong Soo – twice actually, and he was thoroughly convinced that neither of them ever derived even an ounce of pleasure from either experience._

_The first time was not long after the March 1st Movement. Kiku wasn’t sure why it was then that he decided to reopen communications with him – they may have been sharing a house, but they rarely spoke to each other; Kiku was barely there, what with war meetings and the war itself, and even when he was Yong Soo wasn’t that fussed on speaking to him anyway._

_P_ _erhaps predictably, their first meeting wasn’t a raging success. Kiku wasn’t even sure why he instigated it in the first place (guilt, the irritating voice told him; you’re guilty), but he dutifully brought a tray of green tea and delicate rice cakes to the chabudai, and motioned for the other to sit, which Yong Soo did, after a moment of deliberation where he looked as though he was seriously considering kicking Kiku squarely in the face._

_Conversation had been… well, it hadn’t exactly been flowing._

_Yong Soo was wearing a Western suit, largely because he was forbidden from wearing hanbok, and also because he’d been quite clear on the point that he’d rather go naked than wear a kimono. Kiku hadn’t been present at the time, but the workers had informed him through heavy blushes and stuttering horror that this was a threat that he was quite happy to come good on. Kiku had taken over conversation, and it felt very strange, to be the more talkative one between he and Yong Soo. He spoke of anything he could think of – Todai-ji Shunie had gone well in Kumamoto, had Yong Soo seen the Hina Matsuri celebrations taking place, and the cherry blossoms would be blooming soon, would he like to go and see them? Meanwhile, Yong Soo just sat there and stared at him as if in caustic amazement._

_When Kiku had finally given up – around the same time that Yong Soo’s untouched tea had gone cold and it was obvious that Kiku was getting no where with this (and also obvious that he was not a skilled conversationalist in any sense)._

_“_ _You can leave,” he’d finally said, defeated. Yong Soo had wasted no time in climbing to his feet and sweeping out of the room, leaving Kiku alone._

_The next time he’d tried was_ _in 1943, not long before he’d let them go home._

_“_ _I hear you’ve withdrawn from Guadalcanal.” Yong Soo’s voice had been taunting, insolent, and Kiku’s head prickled with irritation._

_“That’s right.”_

_“And I hear you lost Mount Austen.”_

_K_ _iku remained silent, his fingers tapping against the cup._

_“And isn’t it right that the Australians have started using their own planes to shoot down yours?” Yong Soo was unbearably smug. “Oh, and didn’t you have a bit of a loss near New Guinea? And again at those Russian islands?” _

_P_ _atience, Kiku. Have patience. He doesn’t understand._

_“So,” Yong Soo leant forward, mockingly enquiring. “Still confident that you’ll win this war, Japan?”_

_“Be quiet,” Kiku had finally snapped, his hand tightening around his teacu_ _p. Yong Soo grinned and took a sip of his own drink. Kiku gritted his teeth and longed to hit him. He hadn’t come here to be mocked. He’d come here… Why had he come here? He couldn’t remember. He was sure there had been a good reason, however. _

_“It’s OK,” cooed Yong Soo, his tone breathtakingly patronising. “Maybe those white devils you go on about will give you a hand after they’ve crushed you, huh?” _

_“I said, be quiet.”_

_“You’ll need their help, too,” nodded Yong Soo, as though he was an expert on the subject. “Since there’s no way in HELL you’ll get any help from any part of Asia after all this.”_

_Kiku pressed his lips in a thin line. If they didn’t want to help him – fine! He didn’t need their help. He would win this war. Asia for Asians. He was doing the right thing. (You’re not, whispered the voice. He ignored it.)_

_“I mean, you’ve made an enemy out of pretty much all of Asia,” went on Yong Soo. “I mean, China, Korea, Vietnam – we’re not going to help you. And I think you can forget about India and the cousins. There’s Australia and New Zealand – wait, nope, they hate you too. Let’s see… Maybe if the Allies help Germany, your good old ally might send you supplies sometimes!”_

_“Shut up.”_

_“Or, who knows! Maybe you’ll be invaded by America – he’ll probably want to keep an eye on you. Hey! Maybe even Russia-”_

_“I SAID SHUT UP!” Kiku slammed his hands on the chabudai and got to his feet, fury bubbling in his stomach. Yong Soo stared insolently up at him, before standing up also, towering over Kiku – he was almost a foot taller, he had been for centuries, but Kiku had never seen him look so big before. Yong Soo wasn’t smiling anymore – his grin had morphed into a glare. _

_“What’s wrong, Japan? Can’t face the truth?”_

_“You’re speaking nonsense,” snarled Kiku. “You’re speaking nonsense – we will win this war! Asians for Asians! My leaders are trying to help yours! You should be grateful!”_

_“GRATEFUL?” Kiku almost flinched back in the face of Yong Soo’s rage, but he stood his ground. “Grateful? For what? The massacres? You taking away my culture? What?”_

_Kiku swallowed. “My people are saving Asia from the Europeans.”_

_“Really?” Yong Soo’s slate-grey eyes flashed, “Because it seems more to me that we Asians need to be saved from you.” _

_There was a lump in Kiku’s throat. He was tired. He hurt all over. He didn’t want to be yelled at. But he didn’t let that show – he couldn’t show weakness in front of Yong Soo. Not now._

_“You don’t unde-”_

_WHAM._

_Kiku sprawled on the tatami, one hand reaching up to touch his smarting jaw. Yong Soo was still stood in a fighting stance, his fist still raised where he’d punched Kiku in the jaw. One of his teeth was loose in his mouth, and he could taste the iron of his blood. His lip was split, and blood was running down his chin. He blinked._

_Ouch. He hadn’t been hit that hard in a while._

_“Don’t,” said Yong Soo, face livid with fury. “Don’t tell me I don’t understand anything.” _

_Then, once again, he turned on his heel and stalked out of the room, leaving Kiku to spit out his missing tooth – which was nicely matched by the tooth he’d lost last month on the other side of his mouth. (He actually gave himself a nasty fright when he walked past the mirror in the hallway, wearing his black military jacket, lividly pale and with pool pouring from his mouth.)_

_He didn’t speak to Yong Soo again after that._

 

 

 

It was _cold_ down there, he realised now. Horribly cold. Cold enough that his fingers and toes ached and lost feeling, and he was faintly surprised they didn’t actually freeze solid.

According to Ivan, they were in Yakutsk. At least, that was what Kiku _thought_ he said – he thought he’d heard the word when Ivan was babbling to him, and when he’d repeated it (his voice scratchy with disuse) in a questioning tone, Ivan’s face had lit up and – for a moment – he’d looked genuinely happy. Then he’d gone on another tirade, though Kiku was beginning to be able to separate some of the words in his mind.

So, Yakutsk. Maybe. Either way, Kiku had a feeling that that was in Siberia (literally one of the top ten places on earth he didn’t want to be right now - or ever, as it happened) so he supposed that it wasn’t unusual for it to be so cold – but still deeply unpleasant.

At first, Kiku had hoped that maybe the cold would sooth his burns, or at least partly numb them, but nothing doing. He hurt all over, he was absolutely freezing, but his burns, well, burnt. He felt sick and sometimes wanted to cry from the pain – but he didn’t. He hadn’t shed a tear since he was a small child, and he wasn’t going to let _America_ get him down.

 

 

 

_Mei had always been his special one, and he brought her to have tea as often as time permitted._

_Although she was younger than Jia Long, and had been born only a few years before the beginning of isolation, Abel had brought her to see him when he visited Dejima. She’d always been gentle and sweet, always ready to learn his customs, always eager to go for walks with him when she visited. He never had her company long enough to really teach her very much of his language, and the law of the time forbade him from taking her to see any of the landmarks of his home, but he was immensely fond of her, and missed her presence when Abel visited after the Dutch lost Formosa permanently to China._

_After the end of isolation, he’d been amazed at how fast she’d grown – already a teenager! It had taken him centuries to grow up. Either way, she was still the same as he remembered, and after she came to live with him, he rewarded her for her loyalty with gifts and privileges. Not that she was very loyal – he realised now that anything of value that he said was passed right back to China. He knew that even then, deep down – but he hadn’t wanted to believe it, so he’d repressed the knowledge. _

_He hadn’t wanted to see that he was driving a wedge between them_.

 

 

 

In many ways, being in that room was like being doused in cold water, and not only because of the very real cold.

It was like seeing clearly for the first time in a while, or like waking up after having been asleep for a long, long time. It was freeing in a way. He was glad – he’d escaped from the prison cell of his mind.

On the other hand, he’d been put into a very literal prison cell, with nothing but the company of his thoughts, and that was a dangerous thing. At the beginning, when he can do nothing but lay there in pain and try to take his mind off of his injuries, he was forced to confront quite a few home truths, and was quite frankly shocked by how blind he’d been. He’d always considered himself such a rational and logical person – but there had been nothing rational or logical about his actions in the last few decades.

_How_ had he been so stupid? How could he _ever_ have thought that any part of that was a good idea? His people had hurt so many others – _he’d_ hurt so many others.

Kiku remembered his Sensei during the Mongol Empire – he remembered the madness in her eyes, her cruel words, the sword plunging towards him – but he’d never thought that that madness would affect _him_. But it had. And he’d been powerless to stop it.

 

 

 

_Yong Soo and Xiao Chun were always together. Kiku made a half-hearted attempt to split them up, but at the beginning he was too busy fighting, and by the time he was around at home more to notice, he was far too tired to care._

_He barely spoke to Xiao Chun, mostly because he had never really spoken to him or his brother at any point beforehand. He barely knew them, to be quite frank. Xiao Chun had come into being when he’d been in isolation, and by the time he’d come out of it, his younger brother was living in London with Arthur. Jia Long, on the other hand, he had known, albeit not particularly well. The boy had come into being just two or so years before he was taken by João, and Kiku had met him just twice whilst visiting Yao in China. He’d liked the boy well enough – polite, calm, intelligent – but they’d failed to connect on any deeper level. Kiku had mostly spoken to Yao – the closest he ever got to bonding with Jia Long was over a game of Go when it was raining one afternoon. _

_Perhaps due to the fact that they’d never really spoken, he’d never really felt the need to bother Xiao Chun much when he’d lived at his house. Partly because, in his arrogance, Kiku had seen him as being of no consequence. He was just a tiny region, a miniscule part of China. Strategically important, but ridiculously small nonetheless. Whether Xiao Chun approved of his plan or not – who cared?_

_But he found he did care, especially since Xiao Chun went out of his way to get on his nerves. Jia Long he remembered as being fairly inoffensive, but his brother…_

_From the first time Kiku had met him during a meeting with Arthur, he’d been under the impression that the boy didn’t like him very much, so at least he had the satisfaction of being right. Xiao Chun was haughty, proud and stubborn and so… childish. (It was no wonder he and Yong Soo got along so well, he thought bitterly, running his tongue over the gap in his teeth.) _

_Really_ _, Kiku could hardly be bothered._

_He regretted that now_.

 

 

 

Kiku soon came to learn, as time went on, that not only was Russian not as impossible as it had first appeared (not easy, by any stretch of the imagination, but Ivan’s visits meant he was slowly beginning to pick up on words and their meanings), but that Ivan was willing to tell him things if he asked in Russian.

Not everything, but basic information: for instance, by the time he was capable of asking, Kiku discovered that the month was now the May of 1947. He was able to sit up, now, and walk around, but not without a lot of effort, and not without opening the horrific wounds that criss-crossed his body. (They still hurt. He sometimes wondered if they’d ever stop hurting.)

Ivan was coy when it came to information of the international or recent news variety, but he was happy to remind Kiku of just what his situation was.

Japan, Kiku’s country, Kiku himself, was no longer a sovereign nation.

“You’re part of Russia now, Tolenka,” Ivan had beamed, his violet eyes gleaming maniacally. “The Japanese Province. It’s a nice name, no?”

_No_ , Japan had wanted to tell him, _No, it’s a terrible name_.

“And that means that you are now Russian!”

_No, I’m not_.

“And your name isn’t Russian.”

_Because neither am I_.

“So, you have a new name!”

_Please no_.

But he couldn’t dissuade Ivan – he couldn’t fight, he was still far too weak. Hell, he didn’t even have enough command over Russian to pronounce his argument properly, let alone phrase it so it made sense. So Ivan continued to call him ‘Anatoliy Sokolov’ unhindered, whilst Kiku ached for home.

He didn’t leave that basement for a long time.

**Author's Note:**

> Translations:  
> Dobro pozhalovat’, tovarishch: Welcome back, comrade! (Russian)  
> Bánh Cam: A deep fried rice ball covered with sesame seeds.
> 
>  
> 
> Other Information:
> 
> What do you call what your people did in Nanking, for example, little brother? And don’t think I haven’t heard of that little torture chamber your people are running in China.  
> Lien’s making reference to the Nanking Massacre (December 1937 – January 1938), where an estimated 300,000 plus civilians were killed by the Japanese army. She’s also referencing Unit 731 where the Japanese experimented on live humans – usually Chinese, Korean or Russian, although POWs of other nationality were also used. 
> 
> March 1st Movement  
> The March 1st Movement was a public display of Korean resistance under Japanese occupation in 1919. The Korean Declaration of Independence was read aloud in Seoul. A subsequent peaceful procession was violently supressed by the Japanese army, and several thousand Korean protestors were killed.
> 
> Todai-ji Shunie and Hina Matsuri  
> These are both festivals that take place during March in Japan.
> 
> ‘I hear you’ve withdrawn from Guadalcanal.’  
> Operation Ke, a largely successful Japanese withdrawal from Guadalcanal, began on January 14th of 1943.
> 
> ‘And I hear you lost Mount Austen.’  
> Mount Austen was a mountain controlled by the Japanese on Guadalcanal – it was captured by the Allies on January 23rd of 1943.
> 
> ‘And isn’t it right that the Australians have started using their own planes to shoot down yours.’  
> The first Spitfire used above Darwin, Australia on February 6th, 1943. It shot down a Japanese Mu Ki-46.
> 
> ‘Oh, and didn’t you have a bit of a loss near New Guinea?’   
> During the Battle of the Bismarck Sea, Australian and American air forces devastated a Japanese naval convoy on March 3rd, 1943.
> 
> ‘And again at those Russian islands?’  
> The Battle of Komandorski Islands ended in an American strategical victory on March 26th of 1943.
> 
> Jia Long, Xiao Chun and Mei  
> Wang Jia Long is what I call Macau, and my headcanon age for him is 462, meaning that he was born two years before being taken as a Portuguese colony in 1557. His name would be Wong Kha Loung in Cantonese (the main language in Macau), and his Portuguese name (like ‘Leon’ for Hong Kong) is Renato. Mei is the second oldest, and I was seriously considering giving her a new name and having Mei or Meimei be a nickname (since mèimei (妹妹) just means ‘sister’ in Chinese. However, I decided against it since Mei is pretty much the accepted name for Taiwan (I’m not sure if it’s canon or not). In Hokkien I think it would be pronounced Ong Bi (I think? That’s what the internet tells me anyway). Maybe her Dutch name could be Klara. My headcanon age for her is about 400 years old, meaning she would have been born in 1617, about seven years before becoming a Dutch colony. Finally, Wang Xiao Chun is what I call Hong Kong, and my headcanon age for him is around 187, meaning he was born in 1830, about eleven years before becoming a British colony. In Cantonese his name is pronounced Wong Siu Chun, and his British name is, of course, Leon Kirkland. 
> 
> Also, I’ve just realised after writing this that Japan never attacked Macau during the Second World War, so I'm going to have to change that. But I’ll leave my headcanon names in just because.
> 
> João and Abel  
> João Monteiro is my headcanon name for Portugal, and Abel de Vries is my headcanon name for Netherlands.
> 
> Isolation and Dejima  
> Under the Japanese isolationist policy, or Sakoku, only the Dutch were allowed to come and trade with the Japanese, and only at the island of Dejima.


End file.
